Ranged Weapon Prof. and extra Attacks bugged?

I was wondering whether I'm mixing something up or if there's a new bug in the game, introduced by the new patch.

If you create an archer and give him two pips in longbow, shouldn't that mean, that he now has 5/2 attacks at level 1, with a longbow or composite longbow plus arrows equipped and no other buffs active/items equipped?

From what I know, it should be the regular 1 APR which every character has, +1 APR because it's a bow and +1/2 APR because of weapon specialisation. If you just equip a longbow/comp bow without any arrows the char screen states 3/2 APR, but as soon as you equip some arrows it changes to 2 APR. Am I missing something?

I remember PNP rules stated that no matter what your bows ROF (Rate of Fire) determined how many attacks you can make which is desperate from your melee attacks, whether this is a hidden rule in the game, I do not know.

Most bows in AD&D 2E are 2/1 ROF

Though the archer kit in PnP had the ability to get an extra attack and push it to 3/1...

I was wondering whether I'm mixing something up or if there's a new bug in the game, introduced by the new patch.

If you create an archer and give him two pips in longbow, shouldn't that mean, that he now has 5/2 attacks at level 1, with a longbow or composite longbow plus arrows equipped and no other buffs active/items equipped?

From what I know, it should be the regular 1 APR which every character has, +1 APR because it's a bow and +1/2 APR because of weapon specialisation. If you just equip a longbow/comp bow without any arrows the char screen states 3/2 APR, but as soon as you equip some arrows it changes to 2 APR. Am I missing something?

My Archer's APR had also dropped from 5/2 to 2 after installing the patch.

Just confirmed with a Black Pits save, ranged attacks aren't getting extra APR either from Fighter levels or specialization. I don't see anything in the patch notes that points to this, so I'm assuming this is a bug they unintentionally created with the latest patch.

I remember PNP rules stated that no matter what your bows ROF (Rate of Fire) determined how many attacks you can make which is desperate from your melee attacks, whether this is a hidden rule in the game, I do not know.

Most bows in AD&D 2E are 2/1 ROF

Though the archer kit in PnP had the ability to get an extra attack and push it to 3/1...

This may be how it is in PnP, it's never been like this in Baldur's Gate (or any of the other Infinity Engine games). With a bow it should be 2 attacks (base) + extra attacks from weapon specialization + extra attacks from warrior levels.

@Toofy The thing is, this change does nothing to balance ranged weapons when they are most dominant (i.e. the beginning of the game), and the Archer relies on those extra attacks to keep up with melee fighters later in the game, so it doesn't really do anything to make the game more balanced. That combined with the lack of anything suggesting that this is intentional leads me to believe that this is a bug and not a conscious balance decision.

True, if it were balance related certainly it would be stated in patch notes, but currently playing an archer, its still not so bad, if its bug related, we've had 5 updates in 2 months? I'm sure it will be remedied within the week

If that is indeed intended and implemented the same way in BG2EE, no one ever would use archers or ranged at all. The rely on their attacks/pR to keep up with melee in late SoA or ToB - with only 2ApR they are utterly worthless. [as already mentioned]Further, missiles weapons already have a big disadvantage cause of resistance or immunities against them - getting only worse in BG2. Who would ever take a ranged class with 4 ApR (imp hasted) then you can have a devastating melee-machine with up 10 ApR instead? (also imp haste)

Part of the reason for outcry against darts (which gain your strength bonus in PnP) is that a high str (19 as an example) 13 fighter, with GM in Darts, could get 6 attacks per round for14-17 damage a pop, or 12 under haste (the only difference between haste and Improved haste in PnP is that improved haste doesn't age you, but is 3 spell levels higher then haste) since PnP doesn't have an attack cap.

with a nifty @ZanathKariashi :P'd love if you can name the reference, my 'paper' reading material is partially gone or stored at my grandparents or borrowed or...Currently trying to catch up older stuff but have to rely on PDF instead.

[if possible the true title and if it's revised or not and so on? Would be really awesome...maybe in a PM then to not bother the thread]

I'll check around...though off the top of my head, I think it's in the Tactics and Combat book when talking about going above specialization (for the no higher then Mastery for bows/x-bows). Or it could be skills and powers.

Hmmmm...interesting....pg 71-73 of the core player's handbook

Bows and X-bows never gain extra attacks from specialization. Other ranged weapons do however.

Bows and X-bows do NOT gain extra damage from specialization, it removes their to-hit penalty for firing at targets at close range, and gives them a +2 to-hit bonus to those attacks.

Bows DO NOT benefit from warrior level based extra attacks, while crossbows do (which by lvl 13 light crossbows have the same rate of fire as bows)...however, PnP bows can benefit from varying levels of str damage, depending on the bow in question, while X-bows can't.

Hmm, you'd argue for BGEE it is within limits or at least 'okay', cause ranged classes are superior. But in BG2 they are not..if they'd be that capped they never catch up to 25 STR dual-wielding psychos or even 1-handed weapons-wielder. And as already mentioned, countless critter just ignore your stupid arrows/bolts anyway :>

(PnP aside at this point..any game breaks the rules to a certain limit ^^)

Bows and crossbows were never supposed to benefit from the extra 1/2 attack. This adheres to the core rules and is also mentioned in the original manual, and most probably the Enhanced Edition manual as well.

Mmh, I thought the extra APR was a means to balance the lack of +Damage from attributes. What I don't get is, why I am at 2 APR with a level 1 Archer, same as a level 1 Thief. Shouldn't there be some sort of difference? I.e. 1 APR for the Thief, 3/2 for the Archer?

So you are saying:Ladiiiiiiiiiiiiies and Gentlemen, in the left corner the most psycho killer dwarf, who recently got his hands on CromFeayr (in his left hand) and Flail of LOL in his mainhand, boosted by his very awesome trainer Edwin by Improooooooooooooooved Haste! *y<ayayayayayaya*In the right corner....the awesome yet stupid ranger Valygar, with his trusty Longbow fully loaded with his experimental quiver from cespanar! The Bhaalspawns sister got her mind free from plucking blooms so she buffed him with Imp haste as well! *yayaaaaaaaaaaa*

Bows and crossbows were never supposed to benefit from the extra 1/2 attack. This adheres to the core rules and is also mentioned in the original manual, and most probably the Enhanced Edition manual as well.

This doesn't really mean anything. There are too many instances of BG breaking PnP rules to say that just because it's different than what the rulebook says, it's a bug. Also, the manual never explicitly says that ranged weapons don't gain extra attacks (although it does heavily imply it, I admit), and the manuals are rife with errors anyways.

I'd say the fact that ranged weapons have gained extra attacks from specialization/warrior levels all throughout BG1, IWD, BG2, and all their respective patches, along with the fact that it wasn't mentioned anywhere in the changelog for the latest BG:EE patch, is pretty conclusive evidence that it's a bug.

Bows and crossbows were never supposed to benefit from the extra 1/2 attack. This adheres to the core rules and is also mentioned in the original manual, and most probably the Enhanced Edition manual as well.

2 posting above yours it seems to be possible even within the core rules.Also plz mention the page from the manual, as the IWD1 is similar and doesn't have it included. EE' did just copy whatever it found reasonable to include in theirs.

I guess you are dual-wielding like every1 else and don't care about the already crippled archery in BG2...

@Berengar While not obvious at lvl 1, at lvl 2 your thac0 will be 1 better then a thief's, and at level 3 your hit and damage will be better then what even an equal level fighter can achieve. So...you already have greater benefits.

@moopy You only get 1/2 an attack at lvl 7, and the other half at lvl 13 for a total of 1 extra attack. Specialization gives half an attack, and GM adds another 1/2 for another full attack. So if you're a fighter using a melee weapon at lvl 13 with a GM weapon, you should have 3 attacks or 4 if you dual-wield.

If it's only denying you specialization attack, then you'd have 5/2 (2.5) at level 7.

According to the Player's handbook, Bows never get bonus attacks, so they should never go above 2 unless the bow in question is like Tuigan and has 3 base attacks. X-bows on the other hand are shown to benefit from the level based (but not specialization based) extra attacks.

As you can see above, X-bows aren't benefiting from being specialized, but are benefiting from the level based extra attacks, though it clearly shows bows are excluded.

Interestingly, Thrown Daggers and Darts seem to get a full extra attack from specialization, 7th level warrior, and 13th level warrior, rather then a 1/2 attack each like other weapons do.

Here's my understanding of it. Bear in mind that I haven't spoken with the developers, so this is largely my own interpretation of the change:

Launchers, such as bows and crossbows, use their own rate of fire to determine their number of attacks per round, regardless of the wielder's proficiency. For bows, this means you always get 2 attacks per round (even with grand mastery). For crossbows, you always get 1.

Which means that if you were getting extra attacks before, it was a bug that has since been fixed. The primary advantage of ranged weapons is and has always been that you don't have to stand next to your target; in the time it takes your enemy to reach you with his axe of bloodying, you might have pelted him with four or more arrows, which is a distinct advantage before you switch to your melee weapon.

Now, a developer might come in and directly contradict me on this, but that's what it looks like to me.

If this is intended I'll be pissed. The BGII engine with its dual-wielding and its weapon style profs is already extremely biased towards melee. What the hell is even the point of getting more proficiencies in ranged weapons then. BG1 vanilla will certainly have something more going for it. (Besides character models)

Considering melee already greatly over takes range in damage dealt by mid levels I doubt its intended, and has never been that way in any of the old 2nd edition games I played. Though most people didn't actually played ranged characters in table top because they are inferior to melee when balanced without the str modifier under the optional rules, the arguments of how over powered the grand master dart specialist is would never have taken place if they didn't get extra attacks.

The other balancing factor to ranged is that they suffer more resistance and immunity to damage then any other damage type in the game.